After all, Peter Cullen’s towering Autobot has anchored Michael Bay’s live-action Transformers series from the very beginning, and has shielded Earth from all manner of galactic threats over the course of four movies. But The Last Knight signals a fundamental change in Optimus – “rethink your heroes” – who appears to defect from the Autobot cause and raise arms against Bumblebee, of all robots in disguise. Could it be that the Arthurian relic set to feature in Transformers: The Last Knight has corrupted Prime in some way, thereby forcing this change of heart? Or is there something larger at play? We’ll find out soon enough.

MORE FROM THE WEB

Click to zoom

Switching gears from Transformers to humans, we know that Mark Wahlberg is set to reprise the role of Cade Yeager from Age of Extinction. The cinematic reunion doesn’t end there, however, given that Bay has also brought back John Turturro, Tyrese Gibson and Josh Duhamel for the 2017 sequel. Together, they’ll have to contend with the Transformers Reaction Force (TRF), an elite government group designed to hunt down and essentially decommission every Transformers in sight.

Transformers: The Last Knight checks into theatres on June 23, 2017 and when it does, it’ll simultaneously act as a soft reboot of the series and a platform on which Paramount will construct a handful of spinoff movies.